“Who is winning in Ukraine?”
No one really. Ukraine is fighting and bleeding to take back territory that should have never been taken in the first place. If they “win” all they will win is the privilege of rebuilding shattered cities and towns.
Russia is losing and has lost much more than just this war.
The war revealed so many of Russia’s weaknesses and the problem is that the Russians are unable to resolve these weaknesses because the problems are fundamental flaws in Russian culture and the Russian psyche.
Russians are a deeply emotional and deeply feeling people but they are also afflicted with a fatalism similar to that of the Muslims. As individuals and as people they are all too often resigned to their place in life and they give up too easy. I don’t see that getting fixed by an authoritarian dictator like Putin.
Maybe it will never be fixed.
So for now with all things being equal the Ukrainians are slowly defeating the Russians. That doesn’t mean I think the Ukrainians are military geniuses because much of the reason the Russians are being defeated is caused by Russia and Russians.
It’s too much for me to put into a FR post but I guess what I’m trying to say here is that Russia vs. Ukraine isn’t just a military conflict but a cultural conflict.
The Ukrainians have hope for their individual and collective future and the Russians seem to be demoralized even before this war.
Russia has already lost the war
Mother Russia is withering toward collapse internally